Time's Edge
by Axjion
Summary: Based from numerous popular Final Fantasy theories, this crossover features Zell as he tried to save the world, the universe-and himself-after the death of his best friend Squall. FFI through FFX, FFXII, FFXIII. !-!to be completed later!-!


**CHAPTER I :: Something Miraculous Happens**

The saltiest of sweat runs down the side of his face, making his reddish bronze hair cling desperately to his jawline. They're all depending on him and it is imperative he not fail. After all, he can end all the world's suffering - the battles being fought in the streets of Dollet and support requested to the Garden, the hundreds of orphaned children living with only hope of surviving with life and limb - but he hesitates and almost chokes. Irvine, so calm and collected before his peers, isn't ready for this kind of pressure. He's just a kid.

He weighs his options. He could just run now. But he has the power to end this. What if she retaliates? She'd have to break through those iron gates and find him first. What if he misses? There's no guarantee he would if he doesn't make the shot at all.

He breathes deep and wipes the heavy sweat from his face. He clears his mind and tries to alleviate each and every ounce of doubt that clawed at his lonely, pitiful heart. It's now or never, he thinks and so he takes aim with professional expertise and flawless precision, pulling hard on the trigger. The plangent whistle of the bullet is nearly muffled by the roars from the crowd below, though some recognize the sound and respond instantaneously, instinctively, to it; taking cover or looking for its source or shielding the ones for whom they care most.

Irvine doesn't watch them though, the civilians crowding the street in blind celebration, presidential in size and definition. Irvine keeps his eyes on the bullet barreling from his rifle toward its victim. He imagines the bullet to be a lifeline, a timer, a death toll set in the infinity that is but milliseconds. The briefest of moments to others, though to him, an era of waiting, of fear, of sorrow, of pain, of complex emotion a boy of seventeen isn't yet equipped to handle. And to him the moment lasts a hundred years.

His fear sets in, and he was right all along. Just as he knew he would be. Something goes awry.

The target, beautiful and pale-skinned, puts one of her thin, twig-fingered hands up. Edea's hands are the only thing unappealing about her - lengthy and sharp. Her face is sculpted with grace and a feminine elegance not many women acquire in a lifetime. Her petite frame is complemented by a modest form-fitting black dress and an intricate and well-garnished golden headdress calls out in self-importance. But Edea's hands - they are but bladed claws, warding off the many who fall victim to her enchanting allure.

With her bladed hand in air, the bullet deflects from an invisible barrier around her and barrels back into the crowd.

Irvine shakes his head not knowing what would come of this. It was his first mission and the only way he could prove himself. But Irvine's faith broke there, for he had failed.

Edea, however, doesn't believe in failure. To her, there exists either victory or death. There is no between, no mercy for those who fall. Entranced and distracted, Edea's eyes glazed over in cruel indifference, Squall assures himself that she doesn't notice him as he sprints toward her for a second assault. Rinoa, a dark-haired girl in a long blue sweater, can only stare helplessly as the events unfold before her.

With his silver gunblade in hand refracting the festive parade lights in miraculous hues of scarlet and orange and gold, Squall launches himself onto the platform of Edea's float. Still sprinting forward, he readies himself for attack. Edea senses the danger. With her hand in the air, small blue particles materialize above her, forming a razor sharp object expelling cool, icy smoke. Squall thinks to dodge or parry, though he only thinks. Edea is too fast, hurling the icy object toward Squall.

Squall, his chest pierced through, is pushed backwards through the air and off the platform. Rinoa races to the platform's edge, teary-eyed and unbelieving, reaching a fragile hand out to her Hero.

"Squall!"

Rinoa is pulled away from the edge though her eyes are too tear-laden to see so she struggles against them. A brunette girl in a shoulderless yellow ensemble - Selphie - wipes the tears from Riona's eyes gently, ignoring the ones spilling from her own.

"We don't have the time for that," Selphie says.

"Move!"

The order comes from a bossy, bespectacled blonde in a pink dress. She is grasping a thick black whip whose end is wrapped around Edea's neck and a tawny hound accompanies the assault, biting hard at her ankle. Selphie grabs Rinoa by the wrist and leads her away without further question, passing a disgruntled Irvine as he arrives on scene. He tips his hat to them in passing, but doesn't at all make eye contact.

Selphie leads Rinoa toward a door as military men and women crowd around the iron fence, trying desperately to break their way in and save their beloved Edea. The door swings open, nearly smacking Selphie across the face and she assumes a fighting stance. But the teenager who walks through the threshold isn't an enemy. His blond hair is spiked and gelled up into points and his aqua eyes are full of life and optimism. On the left side of his face is a black tribal tattoo painted in dramatic swoops and arcs.

Pushing between the two girls, the teen runs forward. "You get her to safety," he tells Selphie, "I'll go help Squall."

Selphie turns back to him, "But Zell, Squall's dead."

Zell freezes in his tracks. Roundabouting, he orders in a cracking voice "Just go!" and the two girls oblige.

Zell doesn't run to help Quistis and Irvine, and the tawny hound Angelo. He doesn't think about taking down the Sorceress Edea. Zell's mind focuses on one thing alone: finding his friend Squall.

He runs around the platform letting his eyes take in every inch of the scenery but unable to register any of it. The wind flaps his baggy jean shorts and wisps around his black zipper vest and crawls up his nose and into his overactive lungs. Zell is frantic, only able to see the stone walls and iron gates closing in on him, enclosing him in a prison. The crowd of onlookers from beyond the gate shouting an intermingled mix of jeers and cheers aggravate his confusion. Picking up speed and rounding a corner of the platform, he trips and rolls across the black-tar streets.

Raising to his hands, a body lays still before him. Unruly brown hair and a deep scar across the bridge of the nose. Short, black jacket rimmed with faux fur and a gunblade still gripped tightly in one of his gloved hands. A gargantuan ice shard is lodged in his chest and a final vision of shock is etched upon his unchanging face.

Zell recognizes him. Zell knows him too well. Because to Zell, Squall was something like a best friend. Or as close to one as he's ever had.

The sight is unfathomable and Zell loses control, vomiting a puddle of hot dogs. Tears begin to roll. Like Rinoa's and Selphie's he refused to acknowledge before, but they only coax him to crawl toward his late friend.

He kneels beside him, spitting curses into the air, spewing saliva around him. His rage and disbelief is so flagrant, he nearly misses the low and soft whisper of a dying man's last request.

A gurgle startles him, and Zell looks to Squall. His lips are moving slowly, but assuredly, and Zell has to suppress his whimpers to make out the words.

"I-I-I s-saaaw iiiit... Iiin a dreeeam."

"Save your strength buddy," Zell tries to quiet his dying friend

"No... You m-mussst... Take this..."

Using the remainder of his strength Squall raises his free hand, something glowing and evolving and emanating, materializing from light into his hand. An azure gunblade is borne into his hand and Squall delivers his final words.

"You c-caaan saaave us aaaall-l with Lionheart."

Squall's arm falls limp to his side and Zell catches the falling blade with his gloved hands.

And then something miraculous happens. Something unprecedented. Squall - the Hero, the leader - fights shutting eyes like a child evading drifiting off into slumber. His strong arm falls limp to his side and Squall - the Hero, the leader - dies.

Squall floats and begins to glow, his body emitting a visible aura in vibrant colors beyond the ordinary spectrum. Zell is uncertain of the happening, questioning it and putting distance between himself and Squall. Beams of energy flow like rapids from his core, altering and animating everything they touch. Upon impact with the raw energy, the heavy gate lifts open, the walls change color, several witnesses age forward and backward and Quistis, taking a direct hit from a beam in the back of the head, disappears completely, leaving behind just a smoking leather combat boot.

"Run!" Zell orders to Irvine.

Irvine and Edea fly off in opposite directions. Zell climbs to his feet clumsily, nearly slipping in his puddle of bile and sprints away, Lionheart still in hand. The citizens of Deling City are wiser, already running from the scene as the beams change the whole of reality of everything they touch. Most citizens are already disappearing over the horizon unashamedly leaving the slower stragglers in their distant wake.

A thunderous boom breaks the air and ruptures Zell's eardrums, making them bleed while a strange force throws him into the air and he becomes a weightless projectile. Kicking and flailing his arms, he soars dangerously between other airborne debris; an uprooted tree and a luxury car, both closing in on him. He slices and swipes at them with the gunblade but they are both just out of reach.

Then everything stops. Midair. Mid projectory. Vehicles and whole buildings, street lamps and parade floats and living people fill all dimension of the still night air. Zell dares to look over his shoulder. Growing in every direction, a darkness consumes everything. The beams of energy stretching out from it remain the only things perpetuating motion all around him.

This is no normal explosion he knows so he panics, screaming out, and others do the same. The darkness grows on everything taking them all aggressively and without retaliation. He can feel a change in the temperature, the humidity, the sheer intensity of the air as the darkness moves in on him, taking a hotdog stand and crying preteen girl with it.

He sweats, unwelcoming of the oncoming doom, but to his surprise, the darkness stops before him reversing twice as fast as it had come. For a few seconds everything still hangs in the thinning air. Zell can feel the sharpness of the air; it's becoming more and more difficult to breathe. It happens quickly. Everything first blown away by the magnitude of the explosion gets dragged backward toward it with twice the force.

A mechanical sound of grinding and crushing screeches through the air making him grind his teeth. Everything behind him seems to be compressing into one point. Zell is crushed between the tree and car, yelping in pain but never letting go of Lionheart.

Zell is sucked in. The darkness is the last thing he sees.


End file.
